Listening to Images: The Experience of Working with Tactile Illustrations
A few months ago, I had an opportunity to create a visual book that completely challenged my way of seeing, imaging, visualising and making. I must say that the learning has taken me towards a way of engaging with the design that is intuitive, hands-on and poetic. This is simply because, the constraint was big- the images I create, will not be seen! The book was meant to be for visually impaired children and my usual way of approaching ‘image’ from a perspective of the visually able world would not have worked.
This triggered a question, what is an image then, if it is not to be seen by eyes? An image lives in the realm of the seen world. Much about its existence, interpretation and function relies on the visual perception of its maker and the viewer. At the same time, it is also an exper...